Technology/The Internet/Communications

[Linus]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0..._n_598968.html

Facebook privacy Best Practises.

[Bit]

My brother friended me on facebook. I didn't know what to do at first. I finally made a *pure and virginal* account *SNORT* just for family. I told him that the account he friended me on was for my queer friends, many of whom are pagan, and that I didn't think he'd be comfortable reading it, "so please friend me over here instead".... it worked. I check the family account every few days, write a little, look at everyone's pics.... and I keep the politics, the queerness, and the spirituality (yanno, everything that makes me, me?) on my real account.

The internet has always been my refuge, my place to be real and authentic when my life with my family has been closeted. It was utterly weird to have those two worlds collide.

[Gayla]

I'm having some boundary issues with FB right now just because my friend's list is such a conglomeration of folks that I know - old and new work people, clients, family and friends of both the online and off variety. Because of the work/professional connections, I think I use it less for socializing then I'd like to. Over the past week, I've realized that I'm missing out on some things because I'm hesitant to pull some of my connections into this group just because of the potential impact. If it was just about pissing off a few of my more judgmental friends, I wouldn't worry, but if there's even a slight chance that it could truly impact my business, I'm just not willing to chance it.

I've been thinking about just starting a second account to use for the queer, political, leather kind of stuff. My only hesitation is trying to come up with a new damn name! Cuz, you know, I'm so creative when it comes to that and all!

[SassyLeo]

FB-

I don't add everyone. Only people I know and like from online (most whom I have met in person) and people I know in life from growing up or met somewhere along my life journey.

Currently I have 5 people in my "friend request" inbox. Some I have denied before and they keep requesting.

I just purged about 7 or 8 people whom I never interact with or I don't care for their posts. One specifically whom I have met several times here in town and hy/he posts like 10 times a day "I am watching a movie" or "My watch just broke" or "I will eat a burrito for dinner" OR everything is negative and I just don't want to read Debbie Downer.

Also- This is hysterical: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/facebook_suck

[JustJo]

Originally Posted by June

There are so many people now, that I have to go looking for people that I really know to find out what they are up to. Like, I found out this morning that someone I like here in Portland is moving away in July, and I was sad about that!

Sometimes, I get a wild hair and I want to purge, but I also don't want to hurt anyones feelings! And besides, it can feel shitty (or not) when people use Social Media as a weapon to "unfriend" others for one reason or another.

Hi June and pardon the snips...

My FB account is mostly family, although there are a few friends on there as well. I have a ton of young cousins...and while I certainly don't want to unfriend them I am also not terribly interested in the latest middle school spat or 12,000 posts a week they make about things that I don't even understand

I discovered a wonderful feature...you can click on one of those annoying posts, then hover over to the right (you can tell I'm highly technical...sorry) and click on Hide. It will ask if you want to hide the application or the person. I hide all those pesky farmtown, cafe world, etc. applications completely....and also all the updates from my little cousins.

I can still get messages, go to their page, peek at pics, etc. ....but I get to stay out of the lunchroom wars.

[NJFemmie]

I might log in to FB now and again just to see what my family is up to - otherwise, you won't see me on there too often. I am really not a huge fan of social networking sites.

[Gemme]

I only signed up for FB because I was tired of the peer pressure.

At least I get interesting pics of me tagged and some interesting moments and folks that come along, but overall, it's not a huge thing for me.

I hate the apps. All the villes and such are blocked as soon as I see someone coming at me with another one.

[Linus]

This piece is from xkcd, a techie cartoon. It's a few years old since Facebook has powerhoused past MySpace in population, I believe. That said, I wonder sometimes if people friend others just for the sake of... well, friending. To be honest, in many ways, these aren't "communities" in the traditional sense. They are more like networking in a small party sense. You connect with others in hopes of being able to see opportunities (Twitter, in particular, is the worst of this I find and it's partly why I stopped visiting Twitter).

It reduces the human element -- that thing that makes us special -- to near nothingness. Last night I watched "Kill Switch", an X-Files episode written by William Gibson (he's the man who coined Cyberpunk). At the heart of the story was the deeply-in-love couple who wanted to be on the Internet forever. To me, it's sad when we give up our humanness to communicate to each other and instead, we communicate AT EACH OTHER.

Now, don't get me wrong. I do like Facebook. I can ping people and share articles of interest. But I recently contemplated trashing it over a) privacy issues and b) someone who didn't understand that I didn't want their e-vite to a conference. They sent it to me about 6-10 times (I can't remember but I remember getting more and more annoyed). I avoid the apps on Facebook because I do not trust their ability to control privacy. Unlike Canada, the US has the worst privacy policy I've seen.

I am open about my life and I hide nothing. I've had students find me and be very supportive of who I am and what my past is. Does it put me at risk? Sure. But I won't hide who I am. I've always been open but **I** get to decide what I want to share and when I want to share it. Not some third party.

The options, IMO, should always be, what I call, the Novell School of Security. There are two schools of computer security: Microsoft and Novell.

Microsoft maintains that everyone has access to everything unless you dictate no.

Novell says no one has access unless you dictate yes.

I prefer that method.

[sweetcali]

I have different folders? Categories? whatever you call it on my FB. I put real friends in the real friends category, gamers in their prospective folder, etc etc etc. So not everything I post is seen by the world; unless of course that is what I want. Plus I don't post that much anymore anyway; let alone personal info. I used to use Live Journal but I haven't posted on there in years.

sweetcali

[AtLast]

[QUOTE=June;121547]

Mine is a mix of real life friends, work related people/friends, family, people I have known for years online and a few people I don't know at all who added me because we have mutual friends (probably hoping for a farmtown buddy!)

Mine is like this, too and I enjoy FB interaction. I block the apps, however. Yes, have had a lot of mutual friend introductions, but that has been OK.

have to say that as I became so disenchanted with the old B-F site, FB became a good way for me to stay in touch with members as I just stopped wanting to post there.


Sometimes, I get a wild hair and I want to purge, but I also don't want to hurt anyones feelings! And besides, it can feel shitty (or not) when people use Social Media as a weapon to "unfriend" others for one reason or another. I have had people unfriend me because of who I was friends with, and I found it kind of funny, actually. I have also had people unfriend me because I told the truth... (also found that funny).

Oh the social-media unfriending crap! I went through some stuff with this when a person that I do know in real-time was spreading gossip about me and a few FB friends that were mutual in real-time dropped me from their friend list. I figure, these were not really friends anyway and not people I want to associate with. It was interesting, however, to get some FB messages from honorable folks that let me know she was doing this. But, it was a sequence of a friend ... of a friend.... of a friend thing, too. Some pretty wild stories- you know how things get twisted as they go from one person to another. But those that made it clear that they were not going to engage in gossip, were aware of the person's instability. Very weird (and infantile) situation!

I like to use it for local friends when we have gatherings, it's a great way to get the word out and also, I love seeing pictures of peoples animals and children and keeping up with projects they are working on, or happenings in their lives.

Me, too!

QUOTE]

[Linus]

My uncle sent me this video of security specialist Bruce Scheier talking about we are the product, not the customer. It's very interesting and does highlight, particularly in the US, this phenomenon.

My uncle ended up posting the following comment on Scheier's blog:

Chomsky, in a similar vein, has been reminding us for years that the readership is a newspaper's (tv newscast's/whatever's) product.

If you keep this in mind while reading/watching/retching-at the news; the meta- level of modern corporate news media's incoherent offerings starts to become coherent: The news media job is not to inform, but to deliver this product, the audience, to the advertisers